A Child's Life
by JazziePerson
Summary: TV Show Episode Title Challenge - Bonus Challenge #17: Title Challenge: Jen & Emily AND Prompt Set #16: Title Challenge: Dream Logic - Emily and JJ share a deep conversation in the early hours of the morning. Not intended to be Emily/JJ.


**Author's Note: **So, hey guys. It's been a bit of a while. I've just finished my week of work experience so I'm putting this up to celebrate. I have seven days of school left and after that I'm off to Australia for five weeks! So there is going to be a definite lack of stories during that time. I may still write, I may not. But I will pick up from where I leave off at the end of the summer. I promise to try and finish up Four Walls before I leave but I can't promise anything. This is just a one shot so no follow up will be necessary for this one. I am also going to be putting up a huge fourteen chapter story before I go. There will be approximately two chapters a day so please review that. I'll post the first two today!

As to this story: the first prompt I just had to use because I don't anybody else has yet and I wanted to put up something to show the deep friendship that Emily and JJ have after hearing the terrible news about JJ's departure and Emily's fade out, if you like. That made me very upset as Emily is my favourite character. Ah well, she will remain online in Fanfiction forever! The second prompt – even thought I had another story in mind for it – applies because I dreamt this story! I know: I actually had a Criminal Minds dream! I was so excited. Anyway, I dreamt this story so I thought the prompt was appropriate if a little stretching of the rule book.

Thanks for reading my rambling author's note so get back the last couple of minutes of your life by reading the actual story and please review at the end. I may write a sequel – AT SOME POINT but I don't know. It depends on inspiration and feedback. Thanks again.

DISCLAIMER: I don't own Emily or JJ or Elizabeth Prentiss. We know that Emily's father exists but this is my version of him. And as far as we know, Emily does not have a brother so Jonathon Prentiss is mine. Oooh, and I own Nancy!

**Bonus Challenge #17**

Show: First Comes Love

Title Challenge: Jen & Emily

**Prompt Set #16**

Show: Fringe

Title Challenge: Dream Logic

A Child's Life

Emily and JJ sat down at the table in the coffee shop, their cups warm in their hands. Emily put her own cup on the table and shrugged off her jacket. It was February and snow was falling outside. And because of a nasty case, the team had decided to fly straight home, arriving at around four-thirty in the morning. Hotch had sent everyone home and on the way out, Emily had accidently let slip to JJ that she was too wired to sleep and so wasn't planning on going home. And so, of course, JJ had insisted on accompanying her to the coffee shop.

JJ watched Emily with mounting concern. Her friend was twitchy, restless, unable to focus or concentrate.

"So," JJ rested her elbows on the table top, "what's got you so worked up? The case?"

Emily's fingers tightened around her coffee cup. "Yeah, I guess. And it's the whole kids thing, you know?"

"Yeah, nothing like kids being abducted to keep you up at night." JJ shook her head at her rather tired attempt at black humour.

Emily nodded, unfocussed again.

"But there's something else." It was a statement, not a question. JJ may not have been a profiler but even she could see how agitated Emily was.

Emily looked up and her gaze locked with JJ's. She stared into her friend's blue eyes, unblinking until her own eyes dropped to the table top.

"You might as well tell me," JJ told her. "It's obvious you need to talk about it and I'm not leaving until you do. So you might as well get it over with."

Emily looked up, and for the first time, JJ really, really saw the hurt that her friend was carrying around with her. It was just there, in her eyes, piling up with every shitty case, every stab in the back and every other bad thing.

"What is it?" Such ineffectual words.

Emily opened her mouth... and the whole story poured out like an uncontrollable tidal wave of misery.

_A thirteen year old Emily ran down the hallway to her parent's bedroom. She stopped just in front of the door and brushed her fingers through her hair. Her mother would get angry if she found out that Emily had been running around inside the house. She knocked on the door, just as Daddy said she had to._

"_Come in."_

_Emily pulled on the handle and pushed the door open. The first thing she saw was her mother, folding blouses and putting them carefully into the dresser. The whole family had just arrived back from Ukraine and were planning on staying in Washington DC for at least six months. And this was their home. Their actual home. It never got sold; every time they left the country, it was it was all packed up and when they got back, it was all opened up again. _

"_Emily?" Elizabeth Prentiss looked up from the shirt she was folding. "What are you doing in here? I thought you were going to play with your brother."_

_Emily's face crinkled with a frown. "I can't find him. I went to the nursery to get him but he wasn't there. The window was open." She told her mother._

_Elizabeth dropped the blouse. "Did you find Nancy? Did you ask her if she took Jonathon into the day room?" she asked, referring to the nurse who had been employed to look after her son._

"_I couldn't find her. And Daddy said he hasn't seen Johnny all afternoon." Emily informed her mother. "Don't you know where he is?" _

_Elizabeth was out of the door before she had a chance to reply to her teenage daughter. Emily ran after her mother, her concern for her little brother mounting. "Mother?" she shouted after her._

_Her mother didn't reply. She strode down the hallway, her pace torn between absolute panic and controlled panic. She had to remain calm, at least until she had concrete evidence that proved to her that her son was gone. For now, it could just be a mix up – maybe Nancy had him and Emily just hadn't looked far enough or something. Emily was constantly doing that. She never looked far enough or worked hard enough. All she was interested was her social life and boys or something like that. Yeah, that had to be it. Emily just hadn't looked far enough._

"_Mother!" Emily shouted from behind her._

_Elizabeth looked around and saw that Emily had stopped a few paces back and was staring at her, hands clenched into fists. _

"_What? Emily Prentiss, tell me why I should bother myself with you when you're brother is potentially missing and you were the one who was supposed to be with him." Calm, Elizabeth, she berated herself. Calm. _

_Emily didn't say another word. She glared at her mother, her gaze hard as granite, even at thirteen. _

"_Go and find your father. He needs to know about this." _

_Emily's glaze intensified for a second and then she turned, her hair swinging behind her as she marched back down the corridor. _

"She doesn't know anything about me. Even then. She had no clue what was going on in my head." Emily sighed bitterly.

"What happened after that?" JJ asked softly, listening carefully to everything Emily told her.

Emily tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear.

_Emily pulled her father into the nursery. She stopped dead when she saw her mother collapsed on her knees, on the blue carpet. _

"_Liz?" Anthony Prentiss asked. "Liz? What's wrong?" _

_Elizabeth looked up at her husband and daughter. "Emily, go to your room." Her voice was strained, and weirdly strangled. _

_Emily looked between her mother and father in disbelief. "No." She shook her head. "No, I'm not going."_

"_Emily, now." _

"_No, I'm not going. He's my brother. I need to be here." Emily argued._

"_Liz, he's her brother. What is going on?" Anthony backed up her daughter, confusion clear on his face. _

"_Nancy's taken him."_

"Nancy, the nanny had apparently taken him. Or, that's what my mother said. Nancy vanished at the same time Johnny did, so I suppose she took him."

"I'm really sorry, Emily. I never knew you had so much going on." JJ reached over and touched her friend's hand. "Did... did you ever find your brother?" she asked delicately.

Emily shook her head. "They never found his... body."

"How old was he?" JJ really didn't want to upset Emily further.

Emily thought for a moment. "He was almost four. So it was about twenty five years ago. Johnny would be nearly twenty nine. His birthday was in April."

JJ smiled sadly. "He might still be out there. Maybe he just doesn't know who he is and doesn't realise he has a great big sister who still misses him."

That made Emily smile, even if it was just a little one. "No, hopefully, he's got a happy family who love him. That's what keeps me up at night. Amongst other things." she sighed, fiddling with her coffee cup.

"Maybe you should at least try and find him. Garcia could-"

"No. I don't want anyone else knowing. It's another thing that has the potential to come back and bite me in the ass." Emily shook her head.

JJ raised an eyebrow. "There are other things that will come back to bite you in the ass?"

Emily huffed. "That's not the point."

"Yeah. So, now you have to decide." JJ told her. "You have to decide whether to leave the past with the past or go out there and find your little brother."

"When you say it like that it sounds so simple. But there's so much crap in my head." Emily rubbed her temples. "It's hard to work out what I'm feeling and what are thoughts that maybe my mother put in my head when I was a child. Maybe there's a load of stuff up there that isn't mine at all. God, I sound like such an idiot." She shook her head, embarrassed.

"No, you don't," JJ smiled softly. "You sound like you should: confused. You just have to work this out."

Emily nodded, looking up at JJ. "While I think about it, promise not to tell anyone?"

"Emily." JJ raised her eyebrows pointedly. "Remember who you're talking to."

"Thanks, Jayje." Emily grinned. "Yeah, I'll think about it."

"Okay. And you know, if you want to talk it through some more, you can always come and find me."

"Thank you."

"It is now, approximately..." JJ checked her watch, "quarter past five. What do you say to getting a couple of hours of sleep on my fold out couch?"

Emily looked at JJ for a long moment before a smile brightened her face. "Yeah, why not."

JJ grinned and stood up, taking the final swig of her coffee. Emily followed and together, the pair left the almost empty coffee shop and braved the bitter wind. The snow had got heavier but it was still safe to drive and so JJ offered to drive them back to her apartment. Emily let her fuss; she knew that's what her friend needed to do.

It was nice: to have someone want to look after her. But now she had to decide.


End file.
